By Brian Duddy, Product Engineer
A lot of people think that pdfs are “read-only” and can’t be edited. Not true! With the right PDF software, you can easily edit a PDF document. There’s no need to hunt down the original source document, make edits to it in another application, and then convert it to PDF again.
Here’s how easy it is to edit PDF text using Foxit PhantomPDF:
- Open the document.
- Click on the ‘Edit Text’ button near the top-center of the screen.
- To change text, simply locate it and click to highlight it, then type your new text.
- To delete it, just select text and then hit backspace. Or type the new text directly over the highlighted text.
That’s it. But wait, there’s more!
Want to make sure text flows properly between pages and paragraphs? Just use the Link & Join Text feature.
Want to change the font or how it looks? No problem. Select the text you want to change, then use the EDIT tab to change the font type, adjust size, change the margins of a content block and modify the paragraph alignment and spacing. You can even run a spell check on your content to ensure you didn’t introduce any typos.
Want to add new text?
- Select EDIT > Edit Content > Add Text tool
. - Start typing or paste text into the area where you want to add it.
- Choose the font format you want in the Font group.
- In the Paragraph group, you can align the text and set other paragraph options including word spacing, character scale, and line spacing.
Change objects
“Object”, in PDF terms, is a fancy word for images and shapes. You can use your pdf software to edit images, add shading to objects and turn text into graphic objects. PhantomPDF even gives you the ability to work with .ai files (graphics created with Adobe Illustrator).
To add new image objects, just do this:
- Choose EDIT > Edit Content > Add Images tool
> New Image Object 
. The Add New Image dialog box pops up. - Set the parameters and click OK. The window switches to the Image Editor.
- In the IMAGE tab, draw your image from scratch. Or click the Paste button to insert an image from the clipboard.
To see more easy ways to edit content with PhantomPDF, please check out our video tutorials.
Are there limitations to what you can edit with PhantomPDF? Not nearly as many as there used to be. Because the advanced editing features in PhantomPDF lets you make major layout changes, like resizing images, adding tables, and moving or adding text.
Sure, there may be times when it makes sense to go back to the original file. But for most editing tasks, Foxit PhantomPDF’s editing capability is easy, efficient, and economical.
I cant put a check mark in an interactive field on a pdf form im trying to fill in. in phantom foxit business
To put a check mark into an interactive form depends on the creator of the form. If you have created this form, you can create a checkbox- Select Check Box Properties-Options.The option Check Box style will allow you to select Check.
So Foxit reader cant edit pdfs? Then why is it considered a pdf software then??? If it isn’t a real pdf software? A real pdf program would be able to do all of this….
Foxit Reader is our basic PDF viewer. It will allow you to create, annotate and comment on PDFs. If you are interested in editing PDFs please use our Foxit PhantomPDF. https://www.foxitsoftware.com/pdf-editor/
Doesn’t work. Me and my dad was just using it last night. Trying to edit a pdf that was originally “physical” it has actual written stuff on it from a Pen. We were trying to delete said words
and nothing in Foxit could delete them or replace them for us. You know to write something in its place. There is no excuse….What is the point of a pdf reader/editor if I can’t edit a document?
Hand written text is not considered the same as typed(embedded) text. You would need to use the image editor in Foxit PhantomPDF Business to delete handwritten text or scanned text.
How i can add a new page in my pdf file?
To add a page to a current PDF you will need Foxit PhantomPDF. To perform this task Choose ORGANIZE > Pages > Insert > From File, or click the Insert button
How can I keep my page breaks as they are set in Excel? My Worksheet has 4 pages but when converted to PDF, Foxit has created 15 pages.
Hello thank you for contacting Foxit , Currently Foxit does not support a Page Break feature.Hopefully Foxit can provide this in the future.
This solution would be just great…if it worked.
I am trying to edit a pdf document created by me. I try all of the above to edit a particular text object in a saved document but the application does not respoind to changing the default font (Helvetica) in the way you suggest. In fact when the font does change, it changes to a font I have not selected even though the the name of the font I do want is showing in the font field. Incredibly frustrating. Also, I cannot see why, when I edit an existing text object, the font of the new text is not the same as the existing font!
Please send the PDF in question with detailed description of what you are trying to edit to support@foxitsoftware.com and we can assist you with editing this PDF.